Emily dickinsons private world
Emily dickinsons private worldThere are poets and writers like Jack Kerouac and Walt Whitman who lived intensely, who hurtled from one experience to the next and sought to capture it all in their poetry and prose. Then there are poets like Emily Dickinson, who possessed such a rich imagination that though she saw no one but her family for the last twenty-five years of her she created some of the finest poetry ever written. Dickinson was an intensely private person who published just ten poems in her lifetime, in part because she was discouraged from publishing by publishers who didn't understand her poetic methods (Farr, pg. 5). An issue of the Atlantic monthly (which Dickinson read religiously) from January of 1960 recommended that anyone who wanted to be an artist must be lifted away and isolated from worldly surroundings (Farr, pg. 9). It appears that Dickinson took these words to heart. Her poems convey both a sense of intellectual superiority and a sense of isolation that she seems to both cherish and yearn to liberate herself from. Both the structure of her poems and her syntax reveal the contradictions within a poet whose imagination was fed by her solitude but who also desired tangible sensual experiences. It is unlikely that her poems would be so insightful and perceptive had she been engaged in the daily business of dealing with people, for it is only by removing herself from the world that she could analyze it.
Dickinson's poems reflect the cloistered and enclosed world in which she lived-- they are rarely longer than a stanza or two, reminding the reader of small parcels with intricate wrapping that conceals their true intent. Within the poems the lines themselves are short- most are written in tetrameter or trimeter. She left the majority of them written on small slips of paper in her miniscule handwriting and concealed in fascicles throughout her chambers (Farr, pg. 8). Her life and her poetry can seem deceptively small in scale at first glance. However, there is nothing small about the ideas and reflections encompassed within her poetry.
Dickinson's poetry often reflected her voluntary disconnection from society. In "The soul selects her own society"(Ellman and O'Clair, pg. 48), the poet has "shut the door" on the rest of the world. She placed herself in a "divine majority", akin to Gods and emperors, which is reflective of her feelings of intellectual superiority over society. She was "Unmoved" by the chariots and emperors who paused at her gate, she had no desire to engage in communication with those outside her sphere. In the last stanza the lines "I've known her from an ample nation/ Choose One--/Then close the valves of her attention/like stone" indicate that she chooses to remain in "her own society" -she was the "One" whose company she preferred to that of emperors. She seemed to be content with her life as a recluse, but a closer reading of her poetry reveals insecurities that were masked by her private demeanor. She refused to see visitors for most of the last part of her life, and would speak to them only from behind doors or at opposite ends of the staircase (Farr, pg 6). She maintained relationships with people only through correspondence. This allowed her to maintain contact with the outside world without having to deal with the trauma of face to face interaction. By closing herself off from interaction with others, "closing the valves of her attention" she ensured that she would not be touched by the world and potentially wounded by it. She structured her world so that she was shielded from the possibilities of love and loss that are inherent in human interaction. For Dickinson this method of coping seems to have been successful at least to the extent that she found fulfillment in her poetry and she was able to find meaning and joy in her relationship with nature instead of with the outside world.
It is evident in much of her poetry that although she did shun interactions with the outside world, this was largely her own decision and she harbored surprising little animosity towards the world. Dickinson's poems suggest a far more complex individual than the timid, reclusive spinster that is the image many people have of her. Her attitude regarding her relationships with society is evident in the following poem.
This is my letter to the World
That never wrote to Me--
The simple news that Nature told--
With tender Majesty
Her message is committed
To Hands I cannot see--
For love of Her-Sweet--countrymen--
Judge tenderly--of Me (Ellman and O'Clair, pg. 49)
This poem is particularly interesting in light of Dickinson's reclusiveness. She is writing a letter to the world that didn't show interest in her, yet the letter is utterly lacking in the hostility and bitterness that one would expect. It is almost as if she is magnanimously enlightening the world, telling them that she doesn't need them because she ha the privilege of being in close communication with nature. She seems to speak almost condescendingly to the world- the news is "simple". Dickinson implies that simple news is all that the world is capable of grasping from her rich and complex dialogue with nature. Dickinson refers to her audience as "Sweet countrymen", acknowledging their inherent bond as people of the same roots. She implores them to "judge tenderly" her strange and solitary lifestyle because of the bond that she has with nature. One gets the impression that Emily is trying to convey the unique understanding and perspective that she has to an audience that she knows does not understand her. This is supported by the fact that no one would publish her poems during her lifetime0- the publishers all thought them too rough and irregular in form and style. It was only after her death that her genius with language and her ability to capture universal truths in descriptions of every day things were discovered.
Dickinson observed much in the society of her small town of Amherst that contributed to her disaffection for the strictures of her Victorian era. Dickinson's amused disgust for the conventions of society is apparent in the following poem.
Much Madness is divinest Sense--
To a discerning Eye--
Much sense--the starkest Madness--
`Tis the Majority
In this, as All, prevail--
Assent--and you are sane
Demur, you're straightway dangerous-
And handled with a Chain-
(Ellman and O'Clair, pg 49)
She is reproaching the often hypocritical and repressed morals of her Victorian time that labeled her as an eccentric spinster because of her shyness and fear of public places. As a member of a marginalized part of society--unmarried women--she faced the stigma of prejudices held about women and particularly women writers in her day. She implies that the "discerning eyes" of society often make madness out of sensible things and sensibility out of madness. She was perhaps alluding to her brothers' long-term affair with Mabel Loomis Todd, a married woman. Although the affair was public knowledge, her family was still one of the most respected families in their town (Farr, pg. 10). Since Dickinson had removed herself from society she was able to write of their hypocrisy without being tainted by it herself. She seems to feel superior to those still enslaved by the codes of society. She says "Tis the majority/ In this, as all, prevail", implying that what is right is dictated not by any inherent sense of right and wrong but by the prevailing mood of society. Dickinson seems perfectly content to remove herself from society and concentrate instead on her own rich inner life devoid of the hypocrisy and shallowness of the lives she saw around her.
The prism of Dickinson's personality was multifaceted, and though she was content to live in her own enclosed world there was definitely a part of her that wanted to explore the world and live deeply in it, as evidenced by the following poem.
Wild Nights--Wild Nights!
Were I with thee
Wild Nights should be
Our luxury!
Futile--the Winds--
To a Heart in port--
Done with the compass--
Done with the chart!
Rowing in Eden--
Ah, the Sea!
Might I but moor-Tonight--
In thee!
(Ellman and O'Clair, pg. 47)
In this poignant poem, as in all of her poems, she does not state her meaning directly but leaves her audience to draw its own conclusions. She writes of "Wild Nights", which were admittedly rare for her, if they happened at all. She tells an unnamed paramour-- perhaps Benjamin Newton, one of her fathers' law apprentices or Samuel Bowles, an engaging publisher--that "were I with thee, wild Nights should be our luxury." Yet the next line is "futile--the winds to a heart in port", implying that she has not ventured out into the ocean of experience. She can only imagine the wild nights of which she writes. She compares nights with this lover to "Rowing in Eden", calling to mind images of a rowboat meandering through paradise. She expresses her yearning for the worldly experiences that have been denied to her, whether through her own devices or through the lack of interest from the men she was interested in.
Dickinson was a poet of contradictions, but she was able to use her internal conflicts to create poetry continues to a vast range of people. She renounced society to a large extent, and because of this she was able to analyze the world in a way that few poets can. She lived in a private world that she saw as vibrant, complex, and lively. Her poetry reflects her communion with the natural world around her as well as her disconnectedness from society. Because she did not subject herself to the standards of Victorian society, her poetry is full of complex images and "truth told slant" that is evident in few other poets of her day. Her poetry is multi faceted; the reader can repeatedly return to a poem and notice different aspects of her life and beliefs within the poem each time it is read. Dickinson was a unique poet because she was truly able to free herself from the confines of society and live her own life, unfettered, innocent, and free.
Bibliography
Farr, Judith. Emily Dickinson- A Collection of Critical Essays. New Jersey:Prentice Hall, 1996
Ellman, Richard and O'Clair, Robert. The Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. New York:W.W. Norton & Co., 1988.